Casa Grande Ruins

While we stayed in Tucson, we meant to get out to Casa Grande Ruins.  Never happened.  The RV park managers here at Hickiwan Trails told us that getting to Casa Grande from here is only about an hour, and that's where they do their grocery shopping.  FYI, it's really 2 hours.  But we made the trek, because I had big shopping to do, and the local IGA was going to be super expensive and not have everything I wanted.  So as long as we were headed that way, I figured we could also hit the ruins.  So we went to a noon mass, and then lunch, and then the ruins.    

The ruins are neat to see, but there is not a huge site.  We spent a couple hours there exploring the ruins and reading the information in the visitor's center.  I felt that was a good visit.  By the time we left the visitor's center, it was late, so we ended up eating dinner in Casa Grande, too.  It was a nice, relaxed day.

Optical Illusions

Organ Pipe

Looking through my pictures the other day, I noticed that a few of my pictures trick the eye a wee bit. Take this organ pipe photo, for instance. With a quick glance, it looks as though K is holding a cactus arm. Sayeth what? But, nay, she is not. The shadow was a tricky little thing, though. When I was taking the picture, I had the kids move around so they weren't totally obscured by the shadow, but I missed the illusion until I was looking through them again.

Giant G

I love this picture of G. It's as if he's sitting on top of the world. Also an illusion missed as I was taking the picture. But I'm glad to have it!

Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument

Our second full day here we travelled out to Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument. It's about 20 minutes from our campsite, a nice little drive. Our first visit out there, we did a short drive and the visitor's center. Bill and I became Desert Rangers (for not-so-Junior Rangers). We learned a lot doing that booklet!

Bill needed to get some work done, so the kids and I headed back to Organ Pipe to do a longer drive. We intended to hike, but the temperatures we cold, and it was WINDY. Fair weather hiker, that's me. But it makes for happier campers, at least in our family.

Ajo Mountains

Ajo Mountain Drive is a 21 mile loop that is just breathtaking. During our Desert Ranger paperwork, we read about christates, and the booklet had stops along the drive for us to check some out (along with some arches). The ranger booklet also mentioned the Ajo Mountain Drive Guide, so we stopped back at the visitor's center before heading out to get that booklet, which gave us a ton of information for all the numbered stops along the way. We didn't meet with anyone else at the stops, but plenty of people passed us. They missed out.

Saguaro

See this saguaro? It has a couple of christates at the top. It's a growth anomaly. Our book told us about this. So we stopped and checked it out. Man, it was windy.

Musical Organ Pipe

NS was cranky about the cold, whipping wind. But when we read that if you get close to this organ pipe when a breeze comes by, you can hear it play music, NS jumped forth and ran to that organ pipe. It was cool, totally worth the 120 foot hike!

Ocotillo Flower

Lovey me the green ocotillo. Especially with their flowers!!!!

Why

We're staying in the little town of Why. I'm not sure if it's actually Why, we may be in Ajo technically, but we're just a stone's throw from the Why Not store in Why, Arizona. I love it. It's really very pretty here, we've been enjoying the scenery a lot.

Sunset from the Trailer

Last night I stepped out our trailer door and this is what I saw. Simply beautiful. It really is grand all the different things the good Lord has put on this earth.

Painted Rocks

Take nothing but memories...unless someone goes around leaving little painted rocks near Hickiwan Trails RV park, then you can take whatever painted rocks you find. We wanted a painted rock. We went hiking. More than once. Let me show you the desert:

Hiking Area

We hiked from the RVs out to the mountains. We looked. We found...animal poo. Lots of animal poo. Some litter, tons of cacti, some wicked raptors in the sky, and a lot of sunshine. But today, I made my goal. Hiding in a hidey-hole of a saguaro, there was a painted rock.

Painted Rock

Isn't it beautiful? What a great way to get people out and looking around the desert. I love the idea. Today I had somewhat despaired of ever finding one, because the desert is just so vast. And there are no tips for finding one, they're just left around the desert for visitors to find. But I love my little rock, and I want to find more.

Saguaro Friends

Along our journey through the desert, I noticed the saguaros and trees buddy up.

Buddies

Leaning on Each Other

These guys are just a couple of the saguaro tree friendships we saw.

Bird Friend

We also saw a bunch of bird friends for the saguaro. NB had also spotted a coyote, but there's no photographic evidence of that spotting. Good times in the desert!

Hickiwan Trails

I've been wanting to visit Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument for quite a while now, but it's remote. VERY remote. They have a campground inside the park, but there are no hookups. We're in the desert, we should have plenty of sunshine to collect with our solar, right? We've had a bunch of days of gloomy storm clouds and a bunch of rain. And everywhere we go, there are signs that warn about AZ flooding. Who knew? Makes sense when I think about it, because the ground really doesn't absorb the rain that well, but they do only get about 13 inches a year. At any rate, I got a tip for where to look for a campground, and we ended up at Hickiwan Trails. We're on reservation land, the Tohono O'Odham nation.

Our Site

It was raining when we arrived, so all that ground surrounding our trailer was mud. This is the first time since we've had our trailer that we've had to deal with mud. Don't bring those muddy shoes inside!!!! Like I said, though, we've had many days recently where it's been rainy and cold, so we're a bit stir crazy.

The Mountain

This became our goal. Climb the mountain. Ok, it was only three of us, and it was a spur of the moment goal. But the manager of the campground said we could feel free to walk off trail, so we did. G, NB, and I set off on our hike, and NB decided he wanted to climb a mountain.

Green Ocotillo

I took plenty of pictures along the way. G's in front of an ocotillo plant. All the ones we've seen from Big Bend on have been dead looking sticks. After much rain, we've got some green ones around!!! It really does change their looks quite a bit.

The Climb

The climb was steep, with a lot of loose rocks. Many a time we slipped while going up (and again going down!), but we kept going. So close to the top, we were a bit thwarted. It seemed as if there was no way to get to the top. I got involved. No way were we not getting to the top, we were only a few feet (straight up) from it. Hmm.... I fell. HARD. Both my hands and my left side from my hip to my knee got banged up. And since I fell and bounced and slid about five feet, I freaked out G, who thought I might fall all the way back down. We agreed to end our hike, though we're going to come back at a later time and find a way to the top.

Mountain Climb Part 2

K also wanted to go on a hike. We were told that there is a woman who paints rocks and leaves them around the desert for visitors to find and take home. We wanted to find some of those rocks. Not so easy. Along the way, I decided to try and conquer another mountain. These, by the way, are baby mountains, but they are quite a good climb.

The Top

We made it to the top! It was just an outcrop on the mountain, so we didn't make it to the top of the mountain, but we climbed the part we set out to climb. And I didn't fall! The kids do send a bunch of loose rocks flying towards me, though.

Organ Pipe

And we saw some organ pipe cacti along our path. Just at this mountain, though. I wonder why they're nowhere else?